UNHCR warns that as many as 5.5m will need food air across northeast Nigeria next month

AS many as 5.5m people will be needing food aid across Nigeria's volatile north-east by next month according to the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) due to the impact of the Boko Haram insurgency.

 

Due to the insurgency, Nigeria becoming the country with the highest number of internally displaced persons (IDP) in the world. According to the UNHCR, Nigeria currently has 2.2m people living in internal refugee camps and in Borno State about half of the population live in such makeshift accommodation in the capital Maiduguri.

 

Last week, Nigeria's National Emergency Management Agency (Nema) disclosed that about 161,000 IDPs from the north eastern part of the country were still at various camps in the neighbouring countries of Chad, Niger Republic and Cameroon. According to the UNHCR, all these refugees and IDPs will need feeding and the situation is getting dire.

 

World Food Programme (WFP) spokeswoman Bettina Luescher, added: “Because of Nigeria’s economic downturn, the number of hungry people could double in the north-eastern states that are already so heavily afflicted by the conflict.  Our experts are warning it could go as high as 5.5m people by next month as the drop in oil prices and sharp rise in the cost of imported staples has compounded the years of violence that these poor people had to suffer.”

 

She added that the WFP has delivered food to 170,000 people across north-eastern Nigeria, but hopes to reach 700,000 by the year end.  In addition, the WFP is providing aid to 400,000 people in Cameroon, Chad and Niger Republic.

French humanitarian agency Medecins Sans Frontieres said in late July that severely malnourished children were dying in large numbers across northeast Nigeria as food supplies were close to running out. In addition, the aid agency warned of pockets of what is close to a famine.

 

UNHCR spokesman, Adrian Edwards, also said that the situation remained dangerous and volatile, following an attack on an aid convoy last month. He pleaded that armoured vehicles and military escorts are urgently needed to provide protection for aid workers.

 

Nema director-general Muhammed Sani-Sidi, said: “There are still about 18,000 Nigerians in Cameroon, 26,000 in Chad and about 55, 000 in Niger Republic, respectively. All stakeholders have been working and putting in their best."

 

He added that most of the remaining camps were in Maiduguri where there are over 1m IDPs from Borno State alone. There are 26 formal camps in Maiduguri but displaced persons in the camps in other states are voluntarily going back home as almost 40% of these camps have been closed said Mr Sidi.